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The Daily Grind: Do you have an MMO partner?
Everything's always better with a buddy. Sure, you might be having a lot of fun by yourself shooting at everyone in Global Agenda, but it's even better when you know your friend is right there watching your back. And if you decide you don't want to play any longer and move on somewhere new, it's even better to know that your partner is following you as well. You get used to the other person's styles and playing patterns, and you can help compensate for weaknesses. Some of us have a partner who follows us through several games, some of us have partners in any given game, and some of us go through games like The Man With No Name, without anyone at our back. So where do you fall? Do you have a constant companion, a fairweather friend, or just random acquaintances? And which would you rather have, if the choice were totally yours? Every morning, the Massively bloggers probe the minds of their readers with deep, thought-provoking questions about that most serious of topics: massively online gaming. We crave your opinions, so grab your caffeinated beverage of choice and chime in on today's Daily Grind!
Ask Engadget: best network backup solution for multiple computers?
We know you've got questions, and if you're brave enough to ask the world for answers, here's the outlet to do so. This week's Ask Engadget question is coming to us from Steve, who seems to be proving the College Stereotype wrong in a big way. If you're looking to send in an inquiry of your own, drop us a line at ask [at] engadget [dawt] com. "I'm a college student and we are updating our intranet / network capabilities at my fraternity. One idea is to create a network drive for backups for each member living in the house. We already have a network drive accessible by everyone wired in (about 40 people via Ethernet cable), so the raw storage and infrastructure is there. What is a good backup software that is cross-platform (Mac and Windows) and free or relatively cheap? Moreover, once the backup software is in place, what steps should be taken to ensure security of each members data? Thanks!" Any software junkies (or frat admins) out there care to chime in? Seems like a common problem, actually, and we're more than confident that someone sticking to that 4.0 GPA has an answer. Toss yours in comments below.
Editorial: Hey Apple, why does it take an hour to put an album on my iPod?
This one's been a long time comin', but the iTunes forced backup / syncing issue is no less real today than it was a decade ago when iTunes began to play a larger-than-life role in the operation of Apple's iDevices. As it stands, it's effectively impossible to use an iPhone, iPad or iPod without also using iTunes, and while Apple's done an exemplary job ensuring that it works with most major platforms (yes, Windows included), there's one nagging question that just won't go away: why?
Mozy releases iOS client
There are any number of online file storage and backup options these days -- Amazon's new Cloud Drive, perennial favorite Dropbox and Mozy, which I've been using for simple backups. So it's good to hear that Mozy has now released an iOS client that will allow you to view your files stored on its servers. The app has some limitations, unfortunately. Most notably that it's restricted to the US and Canada, although a worldwide version has been promised. Also, it only works with MozyHome accounts (a version for MozyPro is on the way), and can't decrypt any backups you've encrypted with your own private key. If you use Mozy in North America, give the free iPhone or iPad app a try and let us know how you get on with it in comments.
Terminal Tip: Find out which files won't be backed up
Backing up is one of the most important things you can do on a Mac, and thankfully, it's a pretty trivial affair with Time Machine built right in. Of course, when you're looking at what needs backing up, people often overlook what doesn't need backing up (or isn't, but should be). A good example of this would be a rented media file, like a TV show rented from iTunes. It's only valid for 48 hours, so even if you do back it up, by the time you've restored your machine after a system failure, it's unlikely to play anyway. In essence, it's wasted space. Thankfully, OS X has a built-in system of defining what should and shouldn't be backed up using metadata, and for the most part, it happens under your nose without you even noticing. There are times when it would be useful to see what's marked for backup and what's not, however, and that's where we turn to Terminal.
World Backup Day: 1 TB hard drive giveaway from OWC
As the first World Backup Day winds down, we've got one last giveaway, but it's a doozy. If you've followed our urgent pleas for better backup behavior today, your patience may now be rewarded. Whether you back up to the cloud, to a local drive or RAID array, or to a stack of CD-Rs, spare a few minutes between now and midnight to think about your digital footprints. How much would you lose, irrecoverably, if your hard drive coughed and died tonight? Which pictures, videos, projects would be gone? What source code, designs or daydreams would evaporate? Take a moment, make a plan, back up. It's hard to say it any better than Merlin Mann did last year, so go read his exhortation, then come on back and enter our giveaway. The final prize is within reach: the OWC Mercury Elite-AL Pro 1 TB external drive, a quad-interface model with enough room to keep you backing up for weeks. Just leave a comment telling us about your best backup 'save' and we'll enter you to win. (By the bye, if you want to come hang out with your fellow TUAW readers and talk backups, Mac apps or multiplayer iOS games -- there's a meetup for that.) Official Rules: Open to legal US residents of the 50 United States and the District of Columbia, and residents of Canada (except Quebec) who are age 18 and older. To enter leave a comment on this post. The comment must be left before Saturday April 2 at 11:59 PM EDT. You may enter only once. 2 winners will be selected in a random drawing. Prize: One OWC Mercury Elite-AL 1 TB hard drive (ARV $147.99). Click Here for complete Official Rules.
World Backup Day: Ad-hoc backups to the cloud & more giveaways
Happy World Backup Day! The only safe way forward is to back up; that's why we've joined the cause for data saving with tips, techniques and giveaways all day today. As Steve mentioned earlier today, there are lots of cloud-based backup services eager to help you protect your data while solving the onsite/offsite conundrum. A backup of uncertain status in a single location isn't much better than no backup at all -- for one thing, it gives you a sense of confidence that your data is protected when it might not be. Getting your data tucked away with Dolly Drive, Backjack, Backblaze, Mozy, Carbonite or CrashPlan may not be the fastest or cheapest approach, but sooner or later it may save your bacon. Compare and contrast plans here. (Lifehacker has a full rundown on how CrashPlan can help you sleep soundly at night, knowing your backups are solid.) Even if you're not up for a full-on cloud backup solution (whether due to bandwidth or budget constraints), there are still some surprisingly easy ways to back up your key files in the cloud, and do it for cheap or free. All of these approaches require a bit more thinking than the automated tools above, but if you're the sort of person who makes copies of your bank statements or saves your dry cleaning receipts, then you can probably get into these habits, too.
World Backup Day: Turn, turn, turn + more giveaways
Happy World Backup Day! We can't really emphasize this strongly enough: you need good backups, and you need them now. That's why we've joined the cause for data saving with tips, techniques and giveaways all day today. For Mac users running Leopard or Snow Leopard (10.5 or 10.6), the good news about backups is that you've got a pretty solid tool already installed and ready to roll: Time Machine. We've covered the basics on Time Machine before, but there are a couple of ways to supplement and improve your TM experience -- making your backups safer and simpler. Ask an IT professional about backups, and you might hear a maxim like "If you haven't verified that you can restore the data, it's not a backup; if you haven't made at least two copies and sent one of them offsite, it's not a backup either." Most Mac owners would do well to follow these guidelines, as it's far too easy for a single backup drive (especially one sitting right next to your computer) to fall victim to trouble and woe.
World Backup Day: Mozy app puts backed-up files at your fingertips
Here's another product for World Backup Day. Mozy, a well-respected and veteran cloud backup solution for Mac and PC, has delivered Mozy to the App Store. This app, which is a free download that works with any iOS device, gives you access to all of those files from your computer that have been backed up to Mozy's servers. If you're a subscriber to Mozy's service, you can view files from any of the computers backed up to your account. The app tells you when the last backup was completed, and navigating to the individual folders is a matter of a few taps. Once you've found a file that you're interested in using, numerous actions are available -- with a tap, the file can be emailed or opened in a compatible application on your iPhone or iPod touch. Photos stored on your computer can be published to Facebook, viewed in high resolution, or saved to your local camera roll as well. What's cool about this is that it provides much of the functionality of Dropbox (cloud storage) while ensuring that your Mac or PC is being backed up at the same time. Of course, the Mozy app doesn't provide the offline access that Dropbox for Mac and PC does, but neither does the actual Dropbox iOS client. (Update: According to commenter Rdnymllnsktr, it is possible in the Dropbox app simply by tapping the star below a viewed file. That downloads the file as a Favorite, and it is then available to open in a compatible app.) If you have 2 GB or less of critical data that you need to back up, Mozy provides a free account. This is also a great way to try out the backup service. Paid accounts are available over the 2 GB limit for US$5.99 a month for 50 GB (and one computer) or 125 GB (and up to three computers) for $9.99 monthly. Here at TUAW, we're trying to get out the word about World Backup Day to make sure that you're not part of the estimated 80% of computer users who don't have current backups of data. As I always tell computer users, if you haven't lost data yet, you will. "Set and forget" backup services such as Mozy, Backblaze, BackJack, CrashPlan and Carbonite are a low-cost and simple way to keep a copy of your data offsite in case of a local catastrophe.
World Backup Day reminds you to backup your world, today
It's a bit less silly than the National Day of Unplugging, but unless your weekend starts on Thursday, there's nary a snowball's chance in Hades that you're going to skip tonight's network comedy lineup in order to do something that you can clearly put off until tomorrow. But what if, dear readers, your data doesn't make until tomorrow? What if those images from your first date vanish into the ether? What if you spend $4,598 next week in vain as a perplexed computer technician asks you if you'd ever considered backing your critical data up? For those that choose to act on World Backup Day, that future isn't one you'll have to consider, and a host of online backup services are urging you to sign up today in order to protect what's most important to you: your stash of decidedly unbecoming Facebook messages. We'd also suggest investing in a NAS or RAID setup for your home, but throwing everything into a fireproof safe four miles below Arches National Park probably isn't a bad idea, either. You know -- in case your fail-safe fails. Not that we'd ever consider fear mongering...
World Backup Day: giveways, tips and more
Trust the Reddit community to come up with cool, constructive ideas amidst the links to silly images. Today, March 31, is World Backup Day, mostly because some Redditors thought it would be a good idea to remind everyone that hard drives are not, in fact, made from wonderflonium; they fail, and when they do they take your data with them. We think backing up is crucial, and we love to remind you as often as we can about the tools, gear and strategies you can use to make sure you don't suffer unrecoverable data loss when the inevitable happens (or if your machine goes missing). In honor of WBD 2011, we're going to go one step beyond: giveaways courtesy of our friends at Other World Computing and Crashplan. Check in all day today for the goodies! First up: from OWC, two two-pack sets of NewerTech StoraDrive antistatic cases to hold your bare backup drives -- perfect for stashing an offsite backup on the shelf at your cousin's house. Just comment on this post (telling us your backup app of choice, if you like) for a chance to win, and don't miss the bigger goodies later on! Official Rules: Open to legal US residents of the 50 United States and the District of Columbia who are 18 and older. To enter leave a comment on this post about your backup app of choice. The comment must be left before Saturday April 2nd at 11:59pm EDT. You may enter only once. 2 winners will be selected in a random drawing. Prize: One NewerTech StoraDrive two-pack of drive cases (ARV US$14.99) Click Here for complete Official Rules.
Ask Engadget: best home backup solution?
We know you've got questions, and if you're brave enough to ask the world for answers, here's the outlet to do so. This week's Ask Engadget question is coming to us from Michel, who seems to be having difficulty sleeping without a decent backup solution in his home. If you're looking to send in an inquiry of your own, drop us a line at ask [at] engadget [dawt] com. "It's been 6 years since the last Ask Engadget article on best home backup solution. Is there a good update yet? It's for PC, and I need to be able to disconnect the hard drive and plug it in, and navigate the folders like on my main PC. Thanks!" Home backup solutions have come a long way over the years, but having one that also funtions as a conventional external drive cuts down your options somewhat. We're guessing this fellow is looking for something more akin to a Clickfree drive rather than a 5-bay NAS, so if you've got any recommendations in that area, shout 'em out in comments below.
CloudSight Search gives you instant, unified access to email and social networking archives
Remember those thousands of folks who you suddenly lost contact with last week? Unfortunately for them, they're still looking for years of Gmail records, but if they were proactive enough to initialize a Backupify account, they'd have their entire inbox (as well as their outbox, sent folder, and everything else) just a restore-click away. Backupify's free backup services have worked well here at Engadget HQ, providing a level of assurance that our emails, tweets, photos and Facebook statuses aren't going anywhere -- even if an account is hacked. Now, the company's taking the next logical step by introducing CloudSight Search. It's hailed as the first searchable archive solution for social media and Google Apps, and it lets you type in a single search term / phrase in order to sift through your email accounts and social networking handles for any communications related to the aforesaid query. One search, multiple communication outlets. Of course, it only sifts through what's archived, but given just how frequently the service backs things up, it's pretty darn close to fetching in real-time. The only downside? There's no mobile app, so it looks as if you'll have to consult a legitimate browser to get your search on. Those interested in signing up for the private beta launch can do so in the source link, or if you'd rather learn more via video, the play button is just beneath the break.
Google restores Gmail access to one-third of affected users
If you've been following the seemingly-massive Gmail outage, you'll know that it's actually not as massive as it sounds. Google's revised its estimate again to say that only "0.02% of Google Mail users" -- roughly about 38,000 by our calculations -- were affected by the issue in total, claims that a full third of them have already had access restored, and expects the issue "to be resolved for everyone within 12 hours." As to the fate of years worth of email, Google reps wouldn't say, but promised us that engineers are working "as quickly as possible" to see the data restored as well. Keep hanging on, folks.
Gmail accidentally resetting accounts, years of correspondence vanish into the cloud? (update)
If you've got a working Gmail account, you might want to back it up every so often -- as many as 500,000 Gmail users lost access to their inboxes this morn, and some of them are reporting (via Twitter and support forums) that years worth of messages, attachments and Google Chat logs had vanished by the time they were finally able to log on. While we haven't experienced the issue personally, we're hearing that the bug effectively reset some accounts, treating their owners as new users complete with welcome messages. For its part, Google says that the issue "affects less than .29% of the Google Mail userbase," engineers are working to fix the issue right now, and that missing messages will be restored as soon as possible. We'll soon see if this is a momentary setback... or a lengthy wakeup call. Update: No fix yet, but Google's revised its estimate as to how many users might have been affected by the issue -- "less than 0.08%" -- which means we're probably looking at closer to 150,000 individuals, rather than 500,000. We're assuming that the revised estimate means that the initial count wasn't precise, and not that customers are ditching Gmail in droves. Update 2: Google's provided promising but terribly vague guidance on when the situation will be resolved: "Google Mail service has already been restored for some users, and we expect a resolution for all users in the near future. Please note this time frame is an estimate and may change." Update 3: One-third of users have now had their account access restored, according to Google. Read all about it here. [Thanks to everyone who sent this in]
Macworld 2011: Dolly Drive syncs Time Machine to the cloud, creates bootable backup
We're finding many useful solutions here at Macworld Expo, and among them is Dolly Drive. This new solution (they just launched this week) offers encrypted Time Machine sync to the cloud and even creates a bootable version of the local drive you've been using for Time Machine thus far. I spoke with Anthony about the product, how it works and what the future holds. There are three interesting things about Dolly Drive. First, it allows Time Machine to behave just like Time Machine. The primary difference is that your backups live out in the cloud instead of locally. The benefits are obvious. Let's say you're at a meeting in the field, only to realize that an important file is corrupt or missing entirely. If it lives on an external drive back in your home or office, you're out of luck. Dolly Drive lets you restore it from the cloud, using Time Machine's familiar UI, getting you back in business. Check for more and our video of Dolly Drive in action after the break.
Xbox 360 mandatory update restores boot to disc, detains Call of Duty pirates for a tad
The story of the Trojan Horse must be a favorite among video game console manufacturers, because software updates these days often come with more than bargained for -- today, Microsoft issued a mandatory Xbox 360 update, reportedly for a single bugfix, but which seems to have coincidentally halted scores of pirates and hackers from playing Call of Duty: Black Ops and Modern Warfare 2 on the console. Members of the Xbox-Scene forums noted the update was taking suspiciously long to download, discovered that backup copies of these games ceased to work, and presently believe that Microsoft included a patch for these two games to enable an anti-piracy feature that specifically targets burned copies. What does the mandatory update do for you if you're not part of the hacking scene? It merely enables the console to automatically boot a pre-inserted game when you power it on, a feature that was accidentally disabled in November. [Thanks, Brian]
Mac Plus reused as a Time Machine server
Showing us that there is, in fact, a much more useful application for an old Mac Plus than a DJ using it as a helmet, Macenstein reader Dean Gray has turned his 1986 Mac Plus 1 MB into a Time Machine Server. By using an Intel Atom motherboard and replacing the screen with a 10" digital picture frame, Gray has taken an important piece of Apple's history and made it into what could be the coolest 2.3 TB-capacity Time Machine server we've seen yet. Sure beats using a run-of-the-mill Mac mini as a server on style points alone! While I do both online backups with Backblaze and local backups using Time Machine, Gray's Mac Plus server would look a lot better in my office than my boring Western Digital drive looks now. But even if you don't have a Mac Plus to call your own, if you aren't yet incorporating backups into your daily life, you may want to read Erica Sadun's piece about why Time Machine holds a special place in her heart, or Steve Sande's Mac 101 on backup basics. The most important thing is that you start backing up your computer today, no matter the method.
Iomega's SuperHero backup and charger for iPhone syncs without a PC
Iomega was at CES last week showing off its upcoming SuperHero Backup and Charger for the iPhone. You may ask why anyone needs a backup system for the iPhone as iTunes backs up your iPhone when you sync. The Iomega rep explained that many iPhone users don't plug their iPhone into a PC or Mac. They simply use a wall charger, downloading apps directly onto the phone, almost never syncing up with iTunes. Sources at Apple retail confirm this is the case. Personally, I plug my iPhone into iTunes every night to update my podcasts and apps as often as possible. For those who don't sync, however, Iomega is releasing the SuperHero. It's super simple -- you just download an app onto the phone, and then whenever you plug the iPhone into the dock, the app will turn on and backup your contacts and pictures onto an included 4 GB SD card. Lose your iPhone, and you won't lose your important information. Yes, for family members or friends who don't ever sync through iTunes, this might be helpful. But wouldn't it be worth it to teach them how to do it? Syncing seems simple enough to me. Then again, if you don't own a PC or Mac and use your iPhone like a small computer, this would at least give you some assurance your data will persist. The Iomega SuperHero backup and charger should be available by the end of next month for US$69.99.
Clickfree Wireless hands-on (video)
We went out on the CES show floor to find the clickfree Wireless Backup and all of its wireless backing-up power. Coming in two versions -- 500GB or optional 1TB capacities -- the Wireless Backup seems to be a fully capable backup option, competing with other wireless solutions like the Apple Time Capsule and the LaCie Wireless Space. It includes the company's patented AutoRUN feature that takes care of the initial setup, which is simple enough that even non-Engadget readers would be able to plug in and start backing up their files through the waves of the WiFis. After the software is configured for one or more computers, all that is required is a standard outlet for some juice and you're rolling. There's a number of options for those who want to choose specific files for backup and restore. While the clickfree Wireless is certainly competitive and one of the smallest backup solutions we've seen, comparing in size to an Apple TV or a Roku XD, it certainly doesn't share some of the features of being a NAS and WLAN router like the LaCie Wireless Space, nor does it have USB support. Video after the break. %Gallery-113425%
